sbeng

Besides the software, hardware, and various supplies, here's a few unexpected costs I've encountered or thought of: Brand new blue jeans - first day I wore them got ripped by a piece of barbed wire attached to a tree = $30. Poison ivy cream - $30. Parking violations - one for parking by the side of a country road, one that I put 30 minutes on the meter but took 40 minutes to find the cache, and one I got in the same parking lot the cache was in - I swear I was gone all of two minutes and got a ticket (didn't even see them do it - they're fast). All told - $55. (Not too bad for 3 tickets, but still...) So far no emergency room visits - that would be a $100 deductible right off the bat. Almost dunked a $400 camera wading across a slippery creek. There's probably a dozen others things I'm still not expecting..

A "Pack". After all, they're on the hunt and exhibit pack behavior - usually an alpha dog leading the way - a feeding frenzy when the prey is captured. Plus, you'd have a great name for a half-dozen cachers...

I had issues with my 60cs when I got it a few years ago and came to a few conclusions. 1. I love the magnetic compass but they're very sensitive and don't work perfectly. 2. The magnetic compass does not work while clipped to my bike. Points everywhere but the right direction no matter what I try. Too much metal - same as in the car. 3. I got a fancy new watch that had a pulse checker built-in - if I held the unit with the hand that had the watch, I got erratic readings but worked OK in the other hand (took a while to figure that out) Just a thought, you're not carrying a strong magnet with you, are you?

That's where you attach a lanyard.

A good thing to remember, and there's no real way to confirm it, but by my estimates one-third to one-half of the US population might be employed as parking enforcement officers... Also, money can't buy happiness...but it can rent it.

93) Parking enforcement is watching..

A tablet could be the cat's meow for caching; load it up with ExpertGPS and preload aerial and topos, maybe Mapsource and nroute - and the .pdfs - boy that could be nice. However, there's no way my tablet would still be around after just a handful of caches. Hiking along looking even at a handheld GPSr is hazardous enough much less trying to balance and hold onto the tablet - thank you, no, way too many things that could happen to an expensive piece of equipment. But it is nice to have in the car.. Maybe someday they'll make an affordable "Tough Tablet" that would be a little more feasible for caching.

My biggest worry.. right now it's that my inexplainable fascination with geocaching could be an indication of adult onset geekiness..

It sounds like you're not saving the MapSource files in .gpx but instead .gdb - probably why they don't show up or open in ExpertGPS. You need to manually select .gpx when saving from MapSource - check carefully. Garmin has discontinued traking in recent versions of MapSource suggesting instead to use the free nroute program (I rather like it). Check the Garmin downloads page for a link. Hope that helps a little...

The log book often has information on the cover like the name of the cache or a message like "Do Not Remove," etc.. Closing the book may help with muggles or newbies. I've visited a cache that had two notepads in it - one was the official log book, the other, who knows, but there were log entries in both. I say close the book.

I like to record tracks to the caches so I used to hold it in my hand at just the right angle or clip it to the shoulder strap if I have my backpack. I still do that for short distance cache (sadly most of them,) but for the few longer hikes I break out the Gilsson antenna and attach it to my baseball hat. That way the GPSr can ride anywhere - vest pocket, pants pocket, backpack - it doesn't matter, I still have excellent tracks and sat lock when I pull it out. I don't trust the belt clip that came with my 60cs, I jammed it on a fence post once, didn't hurt it, but I don't think it would have taken much more to snap it right off. Also, whenever I can, I try to have that second point of attachment with the lanyard clipped to a belt loop or somewhere - extra security..

Public and/or Private. Maybe Mini golf too.

Congratulations CyBret - an impressive feat in an area where caches are far and wide.

I grabbed a TB and dropped it the same day but forgot to record the number off the tag - now I can't log it and I'm 100 miles away. Do I have to email the owner or is there another way to find it?